


Chasing the Sun

by nerddowell



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Bucky's just plain ol' human this time, Greek and Roman Mythology - Freeform, Greek gods live in Brooklyn because why not, M/M, Pre-Slash, Sam as Helios the sun Titan, Steve as Apollo, icarus - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-15
Updated: 2015-09-15
Packaged: 2018-04-20 23:53:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4807007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerddowell/pseuds/nerddowell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>
    <b>Next, he instructed his son: 'Now, Icarus, listen carefully!</b>
  </em>
  <br/>
  <em>
    <b>Keep to the middle way. If you fly too low, the water will clog your wings; if you fly too high, they'll be scorched by fire.'</b>
  </em>
  <br/>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chasing the Sun

**Author's Note:**

  * For [brooklynboos (thelionkingsguard)](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=brooklynboos+%28thelionkingsguard%29).



> [brooklynboos](http://brooklynboos.tumblr.com) expressed a mighty need for this in the middle of a mostly-unrelated other conversation and since I never pass up an opportunity to write Marvel/Greek myth cross-overs I said, "Hey, I'll give that a go for you!" So yeah. Here it is. Unbeta'ed, as usual, so any mistakes are all mine for being a goof.
> 
> Title from the Sara Bareilles song because I am a heartless son of a gun with a very dark sense of humour.

James Buchanan Barnes, at five years old, is sun-drenched and freckle-faced in the gentle heat of summer. His toes curl as the grass tickles the soles of his feet, and he calls to his father, laughing and chasing leaves floating on the breeze.

"Daddy, Daddy look! Watch me! I'm gonna catch it, I'm gonna catch the sun!"

His father smiles indulgently and follows, laughing as James evades his grasping hands, trying to pick him up. The little boy runs circles around him, smile bright as the June sunlight, and laughs as George Barnes pretends to stagger and almost fall. George makes as though about to fall and squash his son, and the little boy shrieks and laughs, pushing at his father's stomach with small hands.  
"Daddy, no! You'll squish me! Daddy!"

George laughs. "Fee, fi, fo, fum - I smell the blood of a squishy little boy -"

"You're not a giant!" James says indignantly, hands on his small hips, and squints at his father.

"'M bigger than you, squirt."

"I'm not a squirt! I'm a big boy now, Auntie Mary says so-"

"Okay, Mister Big, you wanna be a giant?" George picks him up, arms around James' skinny waist, and settles his son on his shoulders. James takes a swipe at the sky and presses his fist to his mouth, grinning down at his father.  
"I ate it. I ate the sun!"

"What did it taste like?" George asks.

"Yellow," James says, and bursts out laughing.

* * *

James makes a friend at school, a small, golden-haired boy with a light in his eyes like stars, and his name is Steve Rogers. He tells George and Winifred - and even the baby - this with a proud smile, before dragging Steve up to his bedroom to play with his Lego sets. It's Steve who gives James his new nickname, Bucky; after that point, he refuses to be called by anything else, and George and Winifred have to concede that at least it's easier for the baby to say.

Steve becomes such a regular fixture in the Barnes household that Winifred keeps the guest bedroom constantly with a made bed, a fresh towel and a spare wash bag. None of them mind; he's a polite little boy, after all, and there's such an unusual brightness to him, as though someone had caught the sun in a net and poured it all, liquid gold, into the body of a five year old boy.

Bucky insists that he and Steve are 'bestest best friends', and that they will be 'forever and ever and ever'; Bucky misses the quiet sadness of Steve's smile, but Winifred doesn't. She heaps Steve's plate extra high that evening at dinner, and smacks Bucky's hand with the back of her spoon when she catches him inching his fork towards Steve's plate to help him finish the mountain of food. He pouts at her, but quickly smiles when Steve, in a ripple like the ringing of bells, begins to giggle, and then to laugh so hard that tears leak out of the corners of his eyes and he has to catch his breath whilst hanging onto the edge of the table.

That night, Bucky sneaks into the guest bedroom with Steve - as George had known that he would - and climbs up onto the bed, sharing his comic books with Steve by torchlight, carrying snacks he'd pinched from the kitchen. Satsuma peel litters the bed by the time the pair of them are asleep, and it's the light still on, filtering through the cracks in the door frame, that calls George out of bed at 10pm to tuck the pair of them in.

Steve is curled up in the foetal position, one thumb in his mouth; Bucky, beside him, spreadeagled as usual. Steve is sleeping half-on top of Bucky, head pillowed on his shoulder, and the hand without the thumb jammed in his mouth is linked with Bucky's. George pulls the blanket up over them both and turns out the light.

The curtains are still open. That's the only explanation there can be for that butter-yellow glow bathing both boys, still fast asleep on the bed, in sunlight.

* * *

At ten years old, Bucky and Steve are as inseparable as ever. But when winter comes, Steve seems to wilt slightly, and as the weather turns colder, he's constantly ailed by chills and fevers. Bucky argues to be allowed to stay off school with him, to make sure that he's okay, but his parents won't hear of it. Winifred brings Steve's mother flasks of chicken soup anyway, and the moment school is let out, Hurricane Bucky hits the Rogers household as usual.

Bucky asks one of these times, when Steve is sat in bed with a bowl of Winifred's soup and a sketchpad, where Steve's father is. He knows it's one of those questions his mother would rather he didn't voice aloud, but curiosity ends up winning out, and he at least manages to phrase it delicately. Steve glances out of the window at the dim December sky and tears fill his eyes, and he shrugs.

"A long way away." It's all he offers on the topic, and Bucky knows the finality of an answer when he hears it. He nods, and rubs Steve's shoulder affectionately.

"The weather gettin' you down?" He asks, trying to change the subject.

Steve only seems to get sadder as he nods miserably. "Yeah. I just... I miss the light, y'know? It's too dark. All I wanna see is the sun, but he's not here."

Bucky grins at him. "Maybe the hat he's wearing today is a little too big." He starts to sing the song, laughing: "The sun has got his hat on, hip hip hip hooray! The sun has got his hat on and-"

"He's not comin' out t'day!" Steve finishes, nodding at the sky outside the window, but coughs out a laugh and rolls his eyes anyway.

Bucky just grins.

* * *

Summer is blistering, but Bucky would forgive it the heat purely for the joy in Steve's eyes when they step outdoors and his eyes, blue as the sky, immediately gravitate upwards. Apparently in all of his thirteen years of life his mom never taught him not to look directly at the sun, because he'd stand there staring at it in a daze for hours if Bucky let him. The light makes his hair sparkle like gold thread, like a prince's coronet settled over the crown of his head, and it's as intoxicating as the smell of ripening berries on the air to Bucky. He pulls a cherry off a branch positively dripping with fruit and holds it out to Steve, a smirk on his lips.

"Hungry?"

Steve takes it and bites down, groaning with pleasure at the sharp, sweet taste. Bucky grins at him and dumps all of the papers and homework books out of his schoolbag, refilling it with picked fruit. Most of it he'll bring home for his mom, for pies and jams and crumbles and all the other things she bakes; but it couldn't hurt to indulge himself and Steve with a handful or so each before they're due home.

Bucky pops another cherry into his own mouth and licks his lips to catch the juice. There's a trickle down his chin that he misses, and Steve gestures to his own face with one hand to help Bucky catch it. Bucky manages to smear it over his jaw anyway, and Steve rolls his eyes as Bucky sucks the pad of his thumb clean.

"You look like you've been drinkin' blood, not eating cherries. Should I pull my crucifix and garlic out now, or are you waitin' for nightfall?"

"I vant to dreenk your blahd," Bucky intones, holding his arms out like bat wings, and Steve almost collapses laughing. He stumbles to his feet to run away, and Bucky chases him all around Central Park, laughing. Steve is pelting him with cherries from a quickly dwindling handful, trying to deter him, but it only makes Bucky cackle harder before he tackles Steve to the grass and rubs his juice-smeared face over his throat.

"Get off me, ya great lump-"

"Who're you callin' a lump? I'm a vampire, remember, you better be nice or I'll come flyin' in your window at night-"

"Like you've never done that before!" Steve retorts, and Bucky shrugs with a grin. He sits up and obediently climbs off Steve anyway, laughing at the sight of deep purplish-red cherry juice smeared wetly over the side of Steve's neck.

He's glowing in the sunlight, so bright Bucky can hardly even look at him. His eyes are so blue, and above the stained redness of that mouth - he can't stand it. He coughs, feeling the heat rising up over his collar, and wishes he was born with Steve's fair Irish skin that would burn enough to hide the blush. Steve's eyes are on him, warm and wise and knowing, and he grins.

"Besides, vampires've gotta be asked to come in. I might just shut the window in your face."

"You never would," Bucky argues, and Steve smiles.

"Nah, I never would."

* * *

It's at fifteen that Bucky finds out about Steve's father. The reason he always looks up whilst talking about him; something that, in his naivety and Catholic upbringing, Bucky had taken to mean a death. Heaven, of course, is what he associates the sky with, angels and choirs and palaces in the clouds. Steve tells him that the last part isn't so far from the truth, but that there are significantly more gods than just one, and that, well.

His father was - is - one of them.

Steve himself is one, technically. He's not been referred to by his real name for years, the name of the god of light and a thousand other things, but he insists that he's telling the truth. He doesn't have a choice. It's one of the things he's the god of.

Bucky's head is reeling. He crosses over to the window, staring up at the sun, trying to imagine Steve amongst the clouds, glowing the way he does - lighting the whole world. It's not, he finds, hard to imagine; Steve is the brightest light in all of Brooklyn. Always has been. Golden and good and pure, and more precious than anything in Bucky's short life. He glances at Steve, standing beside him and watching him with careful, denim blue eyes. The golden glow that surrounds him has dimmed to bronze, duller and darker - but as Bucky reaches out to slip his fingers between Steve's, it brightens - and brightens - and brightens, until it's white-hot, so brilliant Bucky is almost blinded.

Steve pulls him outside and speaks to the sky, a strange language Bucky hasn't heard before - clipped, but lyrical, like waves rolling over rocks. The sky gives an answering crash, like a peal of thunder, and out of the clouds comes hurtling a figure, arms spread like wings.

He thuds to the ground beside Steve and grins, enveloping him in a warm hug. "Look at you, Junior, you get smaller every damn time I see ya-"

"Sam," Steve smiles, patting the guy's back gently. "This is Bucky. Bucky, Sam."

"Hey, man." Sam shoots him a grin and extends his hand, which Bucky shakes, trying to put out of his mind the fact that this guy had literally just dropped out of the sky. Like a bolt of lightning.

"I've got a favour to ask," Steve says softly, for Sam's ears alone, and Sam turns back to him with a wary expression.

"Be careful what you ask me, Phoebos-"

"Don't." Steve smiles, but it doesn't reach his eyes. "Please. Can we - can he - borrow-"

"I said to be careful what you ask me, Steve," Sam answers, shaking his head. "You know I can't." Glancing at Bucky, he adds in an undertone, "Remember what happened last time I lent them to someone. My-"

"Nobody's talking about Rhodey," Steve answers, and rubs Sam's arm gently when he flinches. "Sam, he'll be with me. I won't let anything happen to him or them, you know that. Right?"

Sam stares at him for a long moment, his dark eyes hesitant. Finally, he sighs, and nods. "Right."

* * *

Steve straps him into Sam's backpack, emblazoned with a beautifully-wrought flaming sun in golden thread, and smiles when Bucky asks, "So Sam, he's the god of...?"

"Not strictly a god," he answers, fixing the buckles carefully over Bucky's chest and tugging hard at the straps. "A Titan. They're like us, but we're kind of them, mark two. The next generation. Literally, actually, in most cases."

"The next generation? Like Star Trek?"

Steve just laughs, shaking his head. "You need to get out more."

"And Rhodey...?"

The smile drops off Steve's face. "Not important. Don't ask."

Sam steps forward next, his eyes intense, coffee-brown and crackling with bronze. "Right, kiddo, listen up. I pull this thread," he shows Bucky a golden cord like a parachute opener, "and you're gonna be on the air. You roll with the currents, you don't go too low and you don't go too high. You hear me? You stick with Steve, and you don't get into trouble. Nobody wants a disaster."

Bucky's stomach starts filling with knots, and he shoots a panicked look at Steve. "A - a disaster? What does that mean? Steve, what does he mean, 'a disaster'-?"

"He means, stick with me and it won't happen," Steve answers, and brushes his fingers over Bucky's cheek. "Don't worry. Everything's gonna be okay." He nods at Sam, who yanks the cord at Bucky's side and -

And suddenly, he's flying. Thousands of feet above the ground, so suddenly it makes his heart leap into his mouth and his head spin and the bottom drop out of his stomach; but at the same time, it's so exhilarating. The sky, infinite open space all around him. He can feel the warmth of the sun on his skin, can see Steve a few feet ahead of him, his own wings brilliant gold in the sunlight.

Bucky spreads his wings and points his feet, laughing in joy as he speeds past Steve, soaring on a billowing gust of wind that carries him, weightless, up into the air. Steve smiles and shows him how to turn cartwheels; Bucky throws himself head-over-heels through the air for what feels like hours, heart so full it could burst. The sun is so warm; so golden, so bright in the sky.

Central Park flits into his mind. Himself, a laughing five year old, pretending to taste the sun. He wonders what it must taste like. Yellow, his younger self said; he imagines differently now. Cherries, melting caramel, and the spices, perhaps, like the inside of Steve's mouth. As the god of the sun, surely it must feel like an extension of Steve's body. He javelins his body again and beams as he presses closer, the heat warm - hot - intense on his skin.

It is so bright he can hardly see. It sears his skin, and there's a dull noise from behind him - perhaps someone calling his name, perhaps just the whistling of the wind in his ears. He reaches out and feels the sun's heat burn on his palm, scooping his fingers, and brings them away coated in burning hot liquid that shimmers like gold, smelling of spices and honey, and licks it off, mindless of the scorching heat. It tastes - as best as he can describe it - infinite. As though there are too many flavours to register, that all melt into one impossible ambrosia.

The heat is too strong. His eyes are fading, white washing his vision, and his skin is growing colder. Air rushes behind his back, clutching fingers at his arms, and there's the leaden sensation in his stomach of a drop like he's never suffered before. As though he's touched Olympos and been thrown bodily down; thrown back to his place.

The panic begins to register as he hears himself begin to scream. "STEVE!"

His heart roars in his ears, breathing tearing at his chest, and hot tears leak down his cheeks. He can see nothing but white; falling backwards, away from the sun and the heat and the light, blind to everything but his own panic. The sound of beating wings registers for a moment before a hand grasps for his, barely closing over the tips of his fingers. His momentum is building.

"BUCKY!" Steve hollers, and Bucky reaches for the sound of his voice, desperate. The grip on his fingers is slipping, and the beating of wings is intensifying as the wind tears at him, the sound of a silver voice softly laughing. Steve's is strident with panic, but Bucky can't hear him. Can barely hear the wind over his own pulse and his screams of terror.

Steve loses his grip moments before the blackness hits him like a sledgehammer, and the water folds around his stinging limbs like salvation.

**Author's Note:**

> The 'last time' that Sam so ominously refers to is a reference to the myth of Phaethon, which I may or may not write an accompanying ficlet for once I watch _Iron Man_ enough to feel comfortable with writing Rhodey's character. 
> 
> Phaethon was the son of Helios, the sun god, and he was teased by his friends about his father not really being who he thought it was. He went to his mother to ask her, and she said it was true and that he should ask Helios. So he did, and Helios said he was happy to prove it and that whatever Phaethon asked of him, he could have.  
> Phaethon asked to be able to drive Helios' chariot, which was pulled by four horses and which dragged the sun behind it. Helios wasn't able to say no, because as a god he couldn't break his word, and so he grudgingly agreed. The ride went ahead, but at the zenith of the journey Phaethon lost control of the horses and the chariot ended up scorching the earth (explaining why Africa was so hot and arid), and crashing, killing Phaethon.


End file.
